


Le Vivant

by QueenOfCarrotFlowers



Category: Overlord (2018)
Genre: Character Death Fix, M/M, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2020-01-13 11:08:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18467716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfCarrotFlowers/pseuds/QueenOfCarrotFlowers
Summary: Ed returns to France after the war for Chloe, but finds someone else instead.





	Le Vivant

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DeadlyToxins](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeadlyToxins/gifts).



> I made Tox watch Overlord b/c I knew they'd love it, and they did, but they also came out of it wanting Boyce and Ford happy together at the end. So here is my attempt at that. I love you, babe ❤️

He found it hard to sleep here, in the village where so much had happened. In this place he had gained confidence in himself, but in the process he had lost both friends, and his own innocence. He had killed a man here, with his hands, and you can't take that back.

A year after his squad had destroyed the church tower, making the victory at D-Day possible, Ed Boyce had made his way back, hoping to find Chloe. He hadn't stopped thinking about her since they left to join C-Division for the final months of the war, and he hoped that she still thought about him, too. Maybe, if he was very lucky, she thought about him enough that she’d be willing to marry him and come with him back to Philadelphia - both she and Paul would be welcome, he could take her out of the small village and to the city where there would be more opportunities for both of them. He knew it was a romantic idea, and his mother had told him as much when he informed her of his plan, but she gave him her blessing even as she warned him it was foolish.

Fate, however, was not on his side. The villagers informed him - as he communicated with them in his broken, strangely-accented French - that Chloe and Paul had left very soon after the Allied Forces. Someone had come to her from London, a boyfriend from University, and he had taken her and Paul back to Britain with him. 

Their house stood empty, and the villagers had no problem with Ed staying there for a few days, so that’s what he did, as he considered what to do next. 

There was another person Ed thought about a lot, and being here again brought him to mind. Corporal Ford - first name Lewis, he’d found out later - who had led their squad in the battle and had died when the church tower collapsed on top of him. He was dead before that, Ed knew, although he hated to admit it. He’d begged Ford to open the gate, to come with him, even as the veins under his skin had swelled and his eyes grew red with blood, his voice gone to gravel. 

Ed didn’t like thinking about Ford like that. He preferred to think of him as they’d met, first on the plane, and then on the ground. Ford was confident, authoritative but not controlling; he had orders to follow and expected others to follow his orders, too, but he was willing to bend when needed. He was also attractive, tall and blonde with a strong jaw and blue eyes that were striking and surprisingly kind. He was, Ed thought, a good man trapped in a bad situation. But weren't they all?

Ford had agreed to Ed’s plan, to ensure the labs would be destroyed along with the tower, and he’d ended up paying a great price for that choice. Another thing Ed hated thinking about. He was responsible for Ford’s death, and that was hard for him to live with.

Ed spent his days wandering in the forests around the village. The church was still a hole in the ground; no one would go near it, even a year later there were stories of ghosts and monsters that haunted the area, but Ed wasn’t afraid. So on his third day he made his way up the road and across the bridge, and eventually he came to the pile of rubble that had once been the church, and the lab of horrors below.

The song of the birds and the chattering squirrels made a strange contrast to the eerie silence that took over and Ed picked his way through the debris. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for or what he expected to find; he just wanted to feel close to Ford, he supposed. He wanted to think about Ford.

Thinking about Ford always led him to the mouse story. He’d be so embarrassed when Tibbet had told him that story, but Ford has surprised him by taking it in stride. He seemed to understand that the story didn’t mean what Tibbet thought it meant, and Ed had loved him for that. It had made him feel understood, for the first time in a very long time.

Chloe had understood, too. The two people who had understood him and they were both gone. Just his luck.

He was so absorbed in his reverie that he didn’t notice the footsteps that made there way over to where he crouched on the top of a wall, gazing down into the pit strewn with debris from the collapse and detritus from the surrounding trees until they stopped, just a few feet from him.

Ed was glad he had climbed down off the wall before he noticed, because he surely would have fallen in if he’d looked up to find the face of Lewis Ford staring at him, as though he were seeing a ghost.

Ed definitely thought he was seeing a ghost. Ford was _dead_ , he was dead before the tower fell. Even if he survived that the… whatever it was that he’d injected into his veins would kill him eventually. Wouldn’t it? It would, at least, make him mad, insane, like the creatures that had chased them in the labyrinthine tunnels beneath the tower. But this man… this man looked thin, and dirty, but whole. Whole, and most certainly alive.

“Boyce?” The man had Ford’s voice, too, although it lacked the authority from Before. He sounded lost.

“Yeah,” Ed replied. “Ford?”

Ford nodded, and smiled, and before Ed knew what was happening Ford had pulled him into an embrace, and his cheek was pushed up against his chest. He smelled like the woods, and a bit sour besides, but not rotten, or bad. Before he thought about it Ed took a deep breath and moved his head to rub his cheek against the other man, which made him chuckle in turn and release him. Ford put his hands on Ed’s shoulders and examined him as you might examine a younger cousin you haven’t seen in a couple of years, in order to gauge how much they’ve grown. As he did this, Ed could see he had a bag shrugged over one shoulder, and a rifle over the other.

“Boyce, what are you doing here?” He still looked as though he wasn’t sure he was talking to a real person.

“Ford,” Ed countered, “What are you doing _alive_? The last time I saw you, you were moments from death. We both knew it. So what are you … just, what _are_ you?”

Ford nodded and took a step back, then turned around and started walking, and gestured for Ed to follow. They didn’t speak until they reached a tiny house - more like a hovel - made of stone and thatch, and Ford led the way in. Ford took a seat on a stool at the table, and Ed sat on the other one there, and they looked at each other for several moments until Ford was able to talk.

“The truth is,” he said, “I’m not really sure. I mean, I remember everything that happened. I remember fighting the kraut, and injecting myself with that shit, and how it made me feel. And I remember you begging me to open the gate.” He grabbed Ed’s hand, which he had rested on the table, and he didn’t let it go. “I never would have, never, but I wanted to. I wanted to go with you. Do you believe me?”

Ed could only nod, and he could feel the hot tears forming under his eyes.

“I don’t think I remember the explosion itself, or the collapse. But I do remember waking up and feeling strange, digging my way out and running. I just… had to get away, but I didn’t know where I was, or why, or anything. I didn’t know my name. I found this place - it was empty, whoever had lived here before was long gone - and I slept. I slept, and at night I would go out and hunt.” 

He didn’t mention what he hunted for, or how, and Ed found himself grateful for that.

“Anyway,” Ford said, his thumb now caressing Ed’s knuckles as he gazed at their joined hands, “eventually I just… came back to myself. I remembered who I was, what happened. I remembered Chloe, and I remembered you.” He glanced back up, and Ed felt caught in the dark look in the other man’s eyes. He could feel the flush in his cheeks, and had to glance away; he felt seen, and a little bit naked. He didn’t pull his hand away, though. Instead, he gave Ford’s hand a little squeeze and cleared his throat.

“Like it was an illness, and you got over it?” He asked, his voice sounding weak and strange in his head.

Ford shrugged. “I guess. Like my body worked through it. I’m still affected by it. I’m stronger than I was, even though I’m thinner now - squirrels and rabbits only get you so far - and my head still feels fuzzy sometimes, but at least I know who I am. And I know who you are.”

“Did you see Chloe, before she left?”

Ford chuckled and shook his head. “No, by the time I was human enough to visit the village she’d been gone for a couple of months.” He paused to suck in his lips, before continuing more quietly. “That why you came back? Looking for Chloe?”

“Yeah. Thought she might marry me. Romantic idea; my mama warned me, you know?”

Ford gazed up at Ed through his eyelashes and smiled; he looked almost shy. Ed found it endearing. “I like it, your romantic idea. I like you, too, you’re good and brave. Not like me.”

“You are good, though, and so brave,” Ed insisted, and he pulled the other man’s hand up to rest it against his cheek. “You were willing to die to make sure the lab stayed buried. That’s much more brave than anything I’ve ever done.”

Ford just smiled at him. “We can agree to disagree. In the meantime, how long are you planning to stick around here? It would be great to catch up. Wouldn’t it?”

Ed thought that he would stay any length of time if it meant he could catch up with Ford, and he told him so. Ford had lived, and that was incredible, and as Ed watched Ford across the table, he realized that he wanted to live, too. Not just live, but thrive. Maybe they could thrive together.

**Author's Note:**

> I usually ship reylo and finnreylo and finnlo but I haven't been able to stop thinking about Boyce, Ford and Chloe since I watched Overlord. This is my first Overlord fic but maybe I'll write more if the inspiration strikes. If you want to come say hi I am leofgyth on Tumblr and finnreylo on Twitter.


End file.
